Customer Engagement Begins at Home

What does Digital Transformation really mean? In post three of our series, learn how engaging your own employees enables you to better reach your customers.

In a previous post, we talked about the customer engagement model and the importance of creating an omni-channel experience that aligns customers with the right channels and information at the right time and on the right device. With studies showing that organizations with over 50% employee engagement retain over 80% of their customers, it is imperative that employees receive the same attention.

After all, your employees are consumers too and your digital channels drive their engagement. Expecting high levels of employee engagement—without the compelling systems in place to boost loyalty, motivation and innovation—is a lose/lose proposition. You not only risk alienating your employees, they in turn are more likely to alienate customers.

Employees today are more tech savvy than ever, and in some cases will bypass IT if they are not satisfied. Avoid this “Shadow IT” threat with technology that meets the needs of the business and the employee. And that investment will pay off. Organizations with a highly engaged workforce increased operating income by 19.2%, while low engagement led to a 32.7% decline in operating profits. As personal and business time continue to blend, enabling easy access to apps, systems and data—regardless of where your employees are and what channels they’re using—is an absolute imperative for your entire workforce.

What’s Your Digital IQ?

Your digital IQ is measured on how well you leverage digital technologies and channels to meet customer needs. But to effectively meet those needs, you first have to meet the needs of your employees. An emerging role for IT is perfecting the employee journey. If you want engaged employees, you need engaging applications. If not, operational efficiency will suffer.

It’s now up to IT to engage employees in the development process. It’s a win/win for everyone. Surveys show that IT decision makers who seek ways to empower employees shorten time to market and reinforce better quality decision-making. And, when business staff can assume low-level tasks clogging the technical team’s queue, IT can refocus on making more strategic contributions that advance business value.

In the end, your employees are your customers as well. Engaging them as such better positions you to survive—and thrive in this climate of digital disruption.

Mark Troester is the Vice President of Strategy at Progress. He guides the strategic go-to-market efforts for the Progress cognitive-first strategy. Mark has extensive experience in bringing application development and big data products to market. Previously, he led product marketing efforts at Sonatype, SAS and Progress DataDirect. Before these positions, Mark worked as a developer and developer manager for start-ups and enterprises alike. You can find him on LinkedIn or @mtroester on Twitter.

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